


Third Wheel Transfer

by orphan_account



Category: Ghost - Mystery Skulls (Music Video), Mystery Skulls (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, i guess?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-02
Updated: 2014-12-02
Packaged: 2018-02-27 19:29:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2703815
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes Arthur thinks that Lewis is the coolest guy on the planet. Sometimes he just wants to shove the guy off a cliff.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Third Wheel Transfer

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to my beta SN_1006. I may have added a few fair bits. Any errors are mine.

They meet in high school. The guy who sleeps in class and jumps a feet in the air, and screams, all loud and girlish, that one time a guy hid behind the classroom door during Halloween with a Freddie mask. The girl who eats like it's thanksgiving and won't stop reading paranormal stuff even while doing 100 sit ups in gym class.

They connect. It's odd how they're so different but as the other kids in the hall say, "Weirdos attract other weirdos," a little too loudly, a little too harsh for Arthur but not effecting Vivi who stands up and says, "At least we're not boring." in that cock sure way of hers. They roll their eyes, say "whatever" in that practiced tone of uncaring but Arthur smiles a little as he feels a small hand on his back. That's all that really matters isn't it?

It starts more of an experimentation spurred on by Vivi. They've both never dated before and after a year of knowing each other, learning dislikes and likes it seems like the best next step. They share their first kiss, soft and furtive during a horror movie marathon. Arthur doesn't know what to do with his hands and squeezes his eyes more because of the stuff on the screen than any actual feeling of romance. Vivi's glasses are in the way and she goes in too quickly, too focused for a first kiss. It's not perfect. It's not romance novel-esque or anything to brag about it - not that they'd ever brag about kisses, too unpopular, too furtive. It's just something that happened.

(Arthur was blushing so hard that he had to use the bathroom. Vivi casually asked if he had to jerk it with a loud sneer and a whistle. He didn't. It doesn't change the fact that by the time he got himself in control Vivi was sleeping on the couch, her purple glasses digging into her face and the television making her pale skin dance in shades of red and black.)

They don't go much further than that, college applications and existential crisis get in the way. Arthur doesn't know what he wants to do but knows he's good with scraps of metal and a welding torch. Vivi doesn't really have the drive for college but she keeps talking about road trips, visiting all the haunted places in the old van Arthur got for his sixteenth birthday.

"Come on Arthur! It'll be fun." Mystery, Arthur's dog that he adopted last fall, whose puppy dog eyes are  _not_  a joke, barks and wags his tail.

Vivi looks at him and smiles and he's hit with how lucky he is. Vivi is his girlfriend and more than that his only friend beside Mystery. She's been with him since the underpants incident, not to mention the pepperoni accident, and stands up for him. She's just asking for one summer trip through the most haunted places in America before they go their separate ways; Vivi to the state university and Arthur to a technical college.

"Fine." He says with slumped shoulders. She kisses him on the cheek and packs up, naming off places from the top of her head like she's been dreaming of this since the day she could read a map. Who knows, maybe she has been, tacks with strings and little childish labels written in crayon. They're going to miss their graduation. Looking at Vivi's bright smile and her hands that wave in the air in her excitement, he finds he doesn't really care.

They break down in front of a purple mansion the next town over in the middle of the night. Not the best start. They knock on the dark wood and wait because the last gas station was a few miles away and maybe the owners have a handyman. Who knows? It doesn't take a long for a boy around their age to open the door and invite them in. His name is Lewis and he's 18, a few months older than both of them. He has broad shoulders, a gentle smile and a servant named Lester. He has dark purple hair, low bangs and an interest in mysteries. He is everything Arthur isn't and it makes him defensive. It makes him want to leave  _right_  now.

"I'm sure the mechanic can help." Lewis says petting Mystery who plopped down in Lewis lap, the betrayer, and did the whole circling before sleeping thing. The pup wouldn't be waking up until he was good and ready.

Conveniently, or not, the mansion's mechanic didn't have the parts and the parts wouldn't come out until at least three days. Arthur, who is pretty handy himself, volunteers to check it again. He spends thirty minutes cursing himself in an attempt to get his old van to work but instead it just lets out smoke and rickety sounds. It groans tiredly, old metal creaking and tires seemingly deflating; it _was_ a used van. When he returns to the mansion Vivi and Lewis are catching up like old buddies and Mystery is licking at broad palms, chewing on a no doubt expensive locket chain.

A week later the van is fixed. A week later and Lewis is sliding into the back of the van, a stupid ascot around his neck and a giant smile on his face. "Let's go gang." He says with a chipper smile. Arthur grumbles as he turns the ignition but Vivi giggles. She throws a smile in the rearview mirror to Lewis and the guy smiles back. Arthur is  _not_  jealous.

He tries to stay mad at Lewis. He really does. He makes offhanded remarks and snooty half-insults but Lewis is more of a softie than the high school bully that Arthur expected. The guy is helpful, tries to do his best even though it's obvious he doesn't know the more pedestrian things. (Note: Never ask Lewis to help with van.) He pays for nice hotel rooms they would have skipped out on, always looks optimistically and buys paint for the van which honestly looks like a piece of shit. He's quite artistic as well, a couple of stencils and some paint spray and suddenly there's "Mystery Skulls" on the side of the van.

"Is this okay?" Lewis asks, paint all over his purple sleeves. Purple, probably _expensive_ sleeves. "I just thought it fit but it's your van-" Arthur and Vivi, at Lewis' behest, went out to buy some well needed supplies. They came back to a retouched van, interior, exterior, the smell of Mystery's last barf incident finally off the seats. Arthur wants to be mad. He wants to go on about permission and 'you should've asked me first' but honestly the van was never his proudest item and Lewis did a better job than Arthur would've done. Arthur would've just made sure the thing was working and that would be that.

"It's perfect!" Vivi says excitedly, staring at the retouched orange paint and the skull half black and half white, the fuzzy blue toy hanging from the rearview mirror and the new purple leather seats. Lewis looks relieved but still looks at Arthur who shrugs.

"You're pretty good at that."

Lewis grins and it's bright and dazzling, his eyes lighting up and the corners of his eyes crinkling cutely. Not cutely. A little cutely, Arthur will admit later to himself and then promptly not think about it.

"Hey, I was thinking, you've been driving a long time. Do you want me to drive for a couple of hours?" And Arthur has been driving since morning. They stopped at a town that had a so-called haunted school and the paranoia was getting to him. It didn't help that Vivi thought it'd be funny to scare her boyfriend and have him cling to Lewis who thought it was okay to hold him in his arms bridal style for the rest of the tour. It also didn't help that Arthur was too scared to let go of Lewis' neck and hide in the other male's chest.

Why was Lewis so likable?

Sometimes Arthur thinks that Lewis is the coolest guy on the planet. And other times he just wants to shove the guy off a cliff.

 

He agrees because he's tired and when he wakes up its to Lewis and Vivi talking about him in the front. He absently pets Mystery as the dog rests on his owner's chest.

"Yeah, he's a big scaredy-cat." Vivi says, he's faced away from them, his head naturally tilts to the seat's cushions but he'd like to think she has a fond smile on her face. The smile she only reserves for Mystery and old books.

Lewis chuckles, "Kind of weird for a guy like that to be searching out all of America's most haunted places."

"It's our last chance to be together, he's going to technical college in the fall and I'm headed to a college 6 hours away."

"You're dating right?" Lewis asks and he sounds curious. Plain curiosity. At least, Arthur hopes it's just plain curiosity. "Are you guys going to break up in the fall?"

Vivi hums and Arthur squeezes his eyes shut. They haven't really talked much about it. Arthur would rather avoid the whole topic together but he knows that one day, one day all those kisses and hugs will be gone. Small nights kissing slowly and cuddling, watching the night turn into day, precious moments like that can't last forever.

"I don't know." Vivi says, "We kind of stumbled into romance, you know? We were friends for a long time and dating Arthur is nice." Vivi is silent for a few minutes and Arthur does not shift, does not breathe, stretching his ear out.

"I don't know." She says no doubt shrugging and Arthur feels his heart speed.

Arthur does not feel sleepy anymore. He also doesn't want the others know he's awake so he stares out the window, watching as stars pass by. He tunes the rest of the conversation out until it's only Lewis' whispered sing alongs in his ears.

It's not until they're down south in an insane asylum in Texas that he starts to accept Lewis as part of the group. It isn't until they're watching fireworks in some Louisiana park that he thinks that this is fine. It isn't until the end of July in Disney World (Lewis paid all expenses, Vivi hugged him tight when he told them it was for her 18th birthday) that he gets it.

They're still together, Vivi and him. But the kisses are more sparse, the awkward lack of common interests are more prevalent, but when he looks at Vivi and Lewis ahead of him, laughing and joking about a mirror maze in which Arthur panicked, he sees it perfectly.

They're both wearing mickey mouse hats, Vivi has purple cotton candy and Lewis ironically got blue, there are balloons tied to their wrists creating a semblance to a wall of privacy and more importantly they're laughing. He wonders if he ever got Vivi this hard laughing just by conversation. Her cheeks are stretched, little laugh lines on her face, her tongue is bright red from some candy. She looks beautiful. He's sure he's never seen her like this. Sure he was entertainment when he screamed and fell down as he always clumsily did. But this was different, this was something else.

He smiles because it was staring him in the face since the day Lewis slid in and said, "Let's go gang!"

"It's just us huh Mystery?" He turns, expecting his dog to be right at his side. He's not. He looks left and right, turns 360 degrees and finds Mystery when he's about to call to Lewis and Vivi.

Ten feet in front of him, Lewis picks out his cotton candy and throws it to Mystery who barks at him happily.

"Just me then."

Lewis turns, frowning when he sees Arthur so far behind, "Come on Arthur!" He shouts, Vivi looking behind with purple cotton stuck to the corner of her mouth. There's the smell of candy and puke in the air, kids running around everywhere and parents speed walking to catch up. There's noise: amusement park theme songs, screaming and laughter; people drawing sketches on the streets, princesses and princes. The most magical place on earth.

He feels sick. That's his excuse to get back in the room he shares with Lewis and Mystery. He lies down in the bed and rehearses the break-up speech in his head.

"It's inevitable." Is as far as he gets before he falls into uneasy dreaming. When he awakes there are gifts on his bedside table and Lewis is already gone. There's a note in the fruits basket and he picks it up:

"Get better soon. Took Vivi to ride the roller coasters. Be back by five.

-Lewis"

It's fine. They all know he's queasy on fast rides and they're looking after him.

He does not break up with Vivi during their brief trip to Disney World. He does not break up with her when July ends. They're slowly heading back home, a few more stops and they'll be done. It's when they're tentatively talking about the future that the hammer hits the nail on the coffin dead on.

"Where are you going Lewis?" Vivi asks her arms splayed wide on the grassy hill, the summer breeze comfortable and the stars bright. They're somewhere in the middle north farming states, a haunted barn drawing Vivi's gaze and of course Lewis and Arthur following.

The crickets are particularly loud tonight and Arthur, who has chosen to sit as far away as possible from the guy, Mystery and Vivi between him and Lewis, does not hear but Vivi sits straight up like a rocket and says, "No way! That's where I'm going!"

And like that his world is falling down, down, down. He's long stopped hating Lewis for solely being there. In the contrary he's developed somewhat of a man crush, if it weren't for Lewis' gentle guidance and soothing words he'd probably wouldn't have survived all the ghost hunting but at the same time; his time with Vivi is clearly over despite their lingering kisses in lieu of the inevitable end.

"Where are you going Arthur?" Lewis asks loudly, its clear that he asked more than once.  _Alone,_ he wants to say but that's not a place.

"Just a little technical college. I want to be an auto mechanic." He says still a little too unsurely.

"You do love taking care of the Mystery van." Lewis says and Arthur pointedly does not tell him that he does it so he can have an excuse not to be around the other two.

They travel to Washington before heading back home. August comes and the fall starts showing in milder temperatures and finally, just a week before the end, he does it.

"Vivi, I was thinking."

"Uh oh," She jokes, a smoothie in her hand and three huge sandwiches in front of her, "better watch it."

Maybe it's because Arthur doesn't laugh. Maybe it's because the air had that sense of finality to it but she stops, setting down her large smoothie and looking at him in askance. They were on one of their dates they promised each other they'd have on the road. Along with her appetite for the paranormal Vivi wanted to taste what the world had to offer in cuisine and Arthur just wanted some relaxing between haunts and so it was a compromise. They've only held to it semi-regularly and their location of choice was actually the hotel's buffet, not really that romantic, but it was the thought that counted.

"Vivi I think we should break up, we're going to different places y'know?" She sits and stares at him, her purple-tinted glasses lying low on her nose but nothing revealing in her eyes. He tries not to panic. He rehearsed this, he prepared for all the possibilities. There's no reason to panic.

He panics.

"I mean, you're going to be six hours away and I'll probably have to cram just to get a C." He grins, half-hearted and tugs and runs his hands through his hair, "Also, I, uh, wanted you to have Mystery, as a parting gift. I mean-" He lets out a puff of breath. "I'll be in a dorm; no pets allowed, and you and Lewis can probably afford an apartment right?"

He winces a little at Vivi's unresponsiveness. "If you can't take care of Mystery I can probably just dump him with my parents." He swallows convulsively. "Vivi?"

Vivi sits and stares, her eyebrows furrowed, processing. He stands up after a moment, knocking his plate into his glass of water, a little spilling over. He does not wipe at it. Instead he gets up and mechanically tucks his chair back in, "I-I'll see you later ok Vivi?" He doesn't wait for his response but hurriedly exits to the lobby where he presses the button with fierceness, muttering, "c'mon, c'mon" as if that would urge the contraption faster.

Lewis exits the elevator but he's too anxious for greetings. "Vivi's in the corner table." He squeaks to his friend before the elevator's close.

Maybe he should've done it later. They still had a week of traveling left and it was no doubt going to be awkward. When he trudges to their hotel room he flops onto the nearest bed and stuffs his face with the duvet.

He hoped it wouldn't be too awkward.

 

The van ride isn't too awkward. Arthur drives because he needs the distraction and Mystery sits at his side on the passenger, Vivi and Lewis seemed to have discussed a few things and they sit in the back whispering to each other. Arthur wouldn't lie, he hoped Vivi would have waited a few until she got together with Lewis and while she seemed sad, her smile not as bright, she still smiled at Lewis with a special kind of peace just reserved for him.

Arthur was not jealous. He had no right to be.

The next few days he lets Lewis drive and Vivi sit in the passenger after Lewis stated he must be tired from all the driving. And he was tired, avoiding someone could do that to you he guessed. He expected cold silences, being avoided with no excuse. It's not as awkward as all that, he was still included in conversations and Vivi still smiled at him (but it's lost his light). Everything was fine.

Then a day or so before Lewis's departure into his fancy mansion, Vivi begged back seat for sleep, booting Arthur to passenger, the awkwardness that stalked them throughout the whole trip settled its claws in.

"You know Vivi was really heartbroken." Lewis said, "She said she knew it was coming but it still surprised her."

Vivi in the back seat didn't so much as even shift. It made Arthur suspicious because he knew of keeping still but on further look her eyes were closed and her breathing was mellow.

Arthur shrugged because what else was there really? It wasn't uncommon of high school sweethearts to break up once they stopped being in high school. Another statistic. Another thing Arthur just couldn't leave well alone until his brain came with a different number of scenarios of how it'll end.

"I really thought you two had something." Lewis continues, his purple gaze sliding slightly to take in Arthur's jittery frame. "I mean you guys weren't the classic couple but you really love Vivi don't you?"

The way Lewis said it, as if he was of awe of it or something. Arthur coughed lightly, his eyes drawing to the sleeping girl, her glasses hanging from the car's handle above the door and her mouth open in silent snores. Did he love her? They only dated because that seemed the natural next step and they hardly held the longest dating record or the furthest sexual encounter, nothing more than make outs.

Such a loaded question. Did he love her?

He loved the way she lit up in excitement, paranormal or otherwise. He loved how she was brave, fist clenched and eyes glaring. He loved how she smelled of grease and men's deodorant because women's were more expensive. How she tasted of food and she was unrepentant, her lips eagerly searching his but only for her to slow down, her eyes looking at him like he was something  _special_. He loved her. He loved her and she deserved something so much more than a kid who was afraid of his own shadow.

The van was quiet, the radio crooning some country song and Lewis was looking at him. He wanted to say look at the road but the light was still red and he could see how that wasn't interesting.

He looked back at Vivi, still asleep and said, "Yeah. I do."

Lewis looked back at the road and hummed, turning up the radio a notch. It was clear their conversation was over.

 

The next day they exchanged e-mails. They already had each others phone numbers but this was the official last day of the trip. Just in a few hours he and Vivi would be back in their hometown. Mystery barked at Lewis' feet, tugging on his purple pant legs to go back to the van.

"Sorry Mystery, I'll see you later for sure." Lewis said, kneeling down to pet the downtrodden pup. Mystery barked, his head tilting to the side all confused-like. The dog was so expressive sometimes Arthur could swear he could just hear it talk.

"Come on boy. You might see Lewis sooner than you think." Arthur whistled and the pup came, looking back now and then. Arthur still didn't get his response from Vivi but he's sure he'd be able to drop the dog with them.

The ride back home was not filled with awkward silence but instead with Vivi gushing about a similar field trip next summer.

"I mean it's not like we'll exactly be short with funds thanks to Lewis. We still haven't been to that place in New York and I hear Canada has a bunch of exciting haunted places-"

"I don't think I'll be able to go." Arthur interrupts, staring at the road with an intensity, there were leaves on the ground, the trees starting to turn that orange color associated with a certain scary holiday. He stares at the leave encrusted road as if he could blast fire from his pupils and burn the leaves into summer time again. It doesn't work.

"Art, are you okay?" Vivi asks and her eyebrows are drawn and her voice is heavy. She leans over, her seatbelt tight against her body and puts a hand on his arm. "I know things have been kind of awkward lately but we're still friends aren't we?"

Arthur looks over and is set by wide eyes and a tiny frown that grows when he looks away. "Of course we are Viv." He says but it sounds wrong on his mouth, stiff and estranged. Mystery between them barks.

"Right. I forgot to ask. Can you take care of Mystery? It's fine if you can't but my parents don't really like Mystery, they think he's some weird breed and I'm going to be living in the dorms-"

"It's fine." Vivi says, "I'm sure I can work something out."

Which most likely means she and Lewis can rent out an apartment together. Vivi can't stay home six hours away and the dorm's don't allow pets; Vivi can't afford an apartment on her own. He wonders while tapping along to the rock song on the radio if they've officially started dating and just haven't told him yet.

They arrive home one week before they're separated for college life. They pack their bags and have three-way skype calls and Arthur helps Lewis and Vivi move into their apartment, (Two bedroom, a little doggie bed already purchased for Mystery and a big TV screen in a nice neighborhood. Mystery whimpers at night and only seems soothed when he hears Arthur's voice so its not like they don't communicate often). Lewis and Vivi help Arthur move into his dorm next Friday (Two cot beds, a little sink and mirror in the corner. His dorm mate isn't that bad but he hates the supernatural. Arthur doesn't know if he should agree or be offended. It says a lot about how easily influenced he is.)

They communicate on an almost nightly basis because of Mystery's 'condition'. They ask about classes, complain about assignments, share new experiences like grains of rice and they tease him about relationships. He pointedly does not ask about theirs. It's written in the mug on the coffee table behind them saying 'best boo', the smiles like cupid's bow, the word 'we' like a stone in a rushing river, always constant.

And he smiles because that's how it was meant to be.

" _Let's go gang!"_

**Author's Note:**

> This was meant to be ot3. i wrote this with ot3 specifically. I guess I just like Arthur/Forever Alone better. (Shit Arthur I'm so sorry, I swear I don't hate you.)
> 
> Maybe sequel ot3???


End file.
